Beautiful board books with good story?

[Sunspot]

Any recommendations for great illustrations and story? 16 month old twins love bear snores on and little blue truck...looking for more. Thank you!

[cuca_]

Big Red Barn by Margaret Wise Brown, Freight Train, Is Your Mama a Llama? I also saw another Little Blue Truck book in the bookstore, but am not sure if there is a board book version.

[citymama]

In addition to the suggestions above:
-- The Hat by Jan Brett
-- My Friends by Taro Gomi (Japanese comicbook style illustrations)
-- Bear and Kite by Cliff Wright
-- Mr Seahorse by Eric Carle (and not a board book, but I think Slowly Slowly Said the Sloth is his most beautifully illustrated book)
-- One Moose, Twenty Mice (anything illustrated by Clara Beaton!)
-- Swimmy, Frederick, or Color of One's Own, all by Leo Lionni
-- Caps for Sale

Also look for other books in the Barefoot Books board book collection (besides Clara Beaton) - really wonderful art.

[elbenn]

Dear Zoo
Goodnight Moon
Time for Bed
Bear Wants More
The Going to Bed Book and other books by Sandra Boynton

[lizzywednesday]

We lean towards finger puppet books in our house.

DD has In My Tree and In My Flower - there's a whole line of these stories (it's effectively the same story with different main character animal "puppets") - the tree one has a baby owl as the main character; the flower one has a butterfly. I gave one of my nephews In My Meadow for his first Easter (we spent it together) because it has a bunny rabbit as the main character.

There's a version of The Very Hungry Caterpillar that has a puppet as well.

One of the first ones I bought for her is Little Bat; it was out around Halloween. She also has Little Giraffe. It's a chubby board book with a very simple, cutesy story, but she likes it just fine.

One thing to note, the puppet does not detach from the book; you stick your finger in it & wiggle it as you read the story. DD thinks it's hilarious - we hoot with the owl and munch with the caterpillar.

She also loves Ten Little Ladybugs - it has rubbery ladybug "buttons' in its pages as it counts down from 10 to 1. It was a bedtime favorite for quite a while!

[annex]

Owl Babies and Snowy Day have great illustrations and stories
Gossie & Gertie and Where is the Green Sheep? have simpler illustrations but are great read alouds

[wendibird22]

Any of the Jan Brett
Whoever You Are
Can You Cuddle Like a Koala (my girls like posing like the different animals)
Time For Bed (Mem Fox)

[Sunspot]

To check out some of these books! I'm starting a list so any more suggestions please keep them coming!

My twins will be so happy!

[candaceb]

Another favorite starting around that age is "Peek-a-Who". DS still loves it. And I second the recommendation for "Dear Zoo" - the illustrations are simple but it's a great story. Now DS knows all the animals and makes their sounds too.

[NJ_Mom2011]

Besides all of the other great suggestions, Sandra Boynton board books with their great illustrations are well-loved here. Right now, my 23rd month old is now into a Mother Goose board book, with Humpty Dumpty being her favorite. For a good simple story, "Have You Seen My Cat" by Eric Carle was good, but the board book was not made super sturdy so I would not leave that one lying around.

[pakin]

We love "The Little Red Train" by Benedict Blathwayt.

http://www.amazon.com/Little-Red-Train-Benedict-Blathwayt/dp/1862306117/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1348618843&sr=1-5

Pakin

DS 4/2001
DD 6/2005

[acmom]

Blue Goose and others by Nancy Tafuri

[jam224]

DD (@17mo) LOVES the "Brown Bear, Brown Bear" book in the Slide and Find version: http://www.amazon.com/Brown-Slide-World-Carle-Priddy/dp/031250926X/

Boynton books are also a hit here. Our faves are "Moo, Baa, La La La" and "Hippos Go Berserk."

DD also loves "Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You?" by Dr. Seuss.

[sntm]

No story, but great art in Leslie Patricelli books. Also two called Fruits and Vegetables that have lovely pop art paintings of produce.

Not a box and not a stick

[blisstwins]

We really liked all the Gossie and Gertie books:
http://www.amazon.com/Gossie-Friends-Olivier-Dunrea/dp/0618176748/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1348639629&sr=8-1&keywords=gossie#_

[hellokitty]

These are board books, but they are silly, fun books that my kids adore...

Click, Clack, Moo series by Doreen Cronin (I love reading this aloud, it's very silly)

Anything Sandra Boyton, she does a lot of rhyming, which is actually a HUGE part of their kindergarten reading assessment, so it never hurts to start early in this dept. I noticed that I didn't read as many rhyming books with DS1 (he preferred more complex books and a lot of non-fiction) and he struggled with that portion of his kindergarten assessment (shockingly, it was like 40% of his points!!!), even though he basically aced the rest of the assessment and was already reading before K.

We also love Ted Arnold books. Once again, these aren't beautiful, but they are silly and fun and the illustrations are goofy.

Anything Eric Carle is always a hit too.

IDK if your kids are into Dr. Seuss yet or not, but my kids love those books, both reading them and having them read to them.

[elephantmeg]

"the napping house" was a favorite that hasn't been mentioned
this isn't quite what you were asking for but we loved "farm faces"
not much on words but very pretty and opens up for a lot of discussion (ie you can make the story up as you go along)- "higher, higher"
"a bear a bug and a boy"-we had a set of 4 of them-quite cute
also by Margaret Wise Brown but not well known-"the little fur family" (our last name is Furr, my MIL got it for us and my bro/SIL)-so cute. Ditto the big red barn and goodnight moon. Love big red barn! (even though I was raised on goodnight moon!)

I keep coming back with more. For really breathtakingly beautiful I love the Eloise Wilkin stories
http://www.amazon.com/Eloise-Wilkin-Stories-Little-Treasury/dp/0375829288/ref=sr_1_10?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1348719805&sr=1-10&keywords=golden+books+collection

We also have this one
http://www.amazon.com/Friendly-Tales-Little-Golden-Treasury/dp/037587495X/ref=sr_1_9?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1348719805&sr=1-9&keywords=golden+books+collection

[happymom]

Another shout out for Sandra Boyton's books. Not the same kind of beautiful illustrations as Bear Snores on, but I love the simplicity of her illustrations. And kids always LOVE her books...Moo Baa La La La was definitely a favorite here too. Snuggle Puppy is another favorite by Boyton.

We love the Llama Llama books (by Anna Dewdney) around here. The board books came out when DD was past board book age, but I'm sure they're great too. I actually just recommended them on another thread here!

ETA: Dr. Suess board books are great too! DD used to love "The Eye Book"- it was once of those that I knew word for word by heart because we read it so much.
http://www.amazon.com/Book-Bright-Early-Board-Books/dp/0375812407/ref=tmm_other_meta_binding_title_0
(I just clicked on "Look Inside" and the pages are a little different than ours. I guess they updated it?)

[NJ_Mom2011]

OP, are you a Costco member? According to my copy of Costco connection, the warehouses will be selling 3 board book collections of Eric Carle. http://www.costcoconnection.com/connection/201209#pg59

[erosenst]

Agree with the Boynton books.

You Are My I Love You is gorgeous. As they get older, they can look for the stuffed animals on every page.

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

[sntm]

Thinking of more! Harold and the Purple Crayon (any of the original ones) are beautiful and simple. Beautiful artwork in the Carl the Dog books though few words, but for toddlers it's fun to talk about what is happening in each one.

[sntm]

And Nancy Tillman!